The Beautiful Bale Mountains continued...
Here we were, up in the Bale Mountains and we've stopped off on a road next to a forest that looked like the film set for scenes from Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter.
We ventured in of course for a wander and you'll see from the photos how angular the trees were. HI TIM!
So much moss! So much that I think Chris and Tim slipped off the branch as they tried to jump off it.
After a short break in the forest, we drove off again and whilst we did get glimpses of sun we were soon in and amongst the clouds again and it was pretty grey as we reached a small village called Robe. As we approached, we saw in the distance a gathering of people, that very soon became obvious that they were playing a game of volleyball. We couldn't help but cheer them on from our car window and they all waved back :-)
Our stop in Robe was a great opportunity for our driver Faisal to get some refreshments, only this time it wasn't just coffee - he was treated to traditional Ethiopian bread and honey.
It was here I wanted to take photos of families and people in their environment due to the traditional, homely feel of the town. Kal approached a woman who was cradling her baby and surrounded by younger children, and asked her if she was happy for me to take her photo. Sadly (and understandably) she declined, but I did manage to take some shots of the town. Also, it is here in this town where I felt a similar experience to when I went to the Philippines for the first time. I don't want to call it culture shock, because to me that insinuates that I was flabbergasted by my surroundings, but it was more... culture appreciation, an overwhelming experience. We were so far away from the capital, and we had been driving through the mountains for a while and this was the first stop off we'd made in the mountains that was in a community.
So as Faisal, Tora and Kal were enjoying their second breakfast, I took some shots as I couldn't help but appreciate their simple living, their welcoming hospitality, the community feel and the volleyball!
We soon moved on as there was more to see, plus we were due to walk around the national park that evening. So we headed back the way we came, back towards the hotel but since we were running on time, Faisal and Kal decided to take us on a detour to Tulu Dimtu, Ethiopia's second highest mountain at 4333m above sea level, just under half the height of Mount Everest.
As we were so high up, the weather went pretty quickly from grim...
... to beautiful blue skies! We went quite a while up in the skies, which gave me a great opportunity to take some shots on my bridge camera and GoPro. My bridge camera is a Nikon P510 with a 42x optical zoom, which I have named "stalker zoom"...
This wasn't even at full zoom! But for me, it was so great to take shots of the these three together again and in Ethiopia no less :-)